


An Ever Spinning Wheel

by astreamofstars



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-10
Updated: 2011-10-10
Packaged: 2017-10-24 11:41:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,761
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/263066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/astreamofstars/pseuds/astreamofstars
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Betrayal after betrayal. Where do they stop?</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Ever Spinning Wheel

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Civic Duty](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/4912) by whatever_lj. 



> Beta Thanks: Thank you to the wonderful icedteainthebag and somadanne for being awesome and handholding my way through my first proper betaing experience. I apologise for the Googling I made you do, icedtea, and for leaving it all so late and sending stupidly long emails, somadanne!

Afterwards, as he relaxes into sleep, she listens to his heart beating, the gentle tempo of the _thud, thud_ rhythmic under her ear. It's a steady heart, in a warm, strong chest, and she idly traces her fingers along the seam that bisects it, recalling the moment her Captain Apollo, blood drenched, had told her of the shooting. The panic she'd felt, the helplessness from behind the bars, the realisation that the loss of this man would be more than just a professional loss for her. That she'd come to care about him, somehow.

The aftermath of the first time she'd told herself that what Bill Adama didn't know could be for the good of the Fleet.

It isn't like it isn't _true_. Care as she does about this man, this stubborn, kind, awkward, wonderful man, he can't see what she sees sometimes. _Won't_ see. The Fleet can't eat ideals. Can't breathe morality. Forcing him to look these things in the face only breaks his heart, and she's seen that look in his eyes too often in the short time she's known him to want to see it again.

No, it's better this way. What he doesn't know can't hurt him. What he doesn't know gives her the space to do her duty, which doesn't let up just because of a number written on a page. There's a larger number, carved deeply into the fibres of her heart, that supersedes it every time.

She'd planned to doze alongside him, but she's too worked up, unsatisfied and uneasy, her thoughts whirring. She shifts her over-sensitised body against his, and he tightens his arm around her waist in unconscious response.

 _"Kidding, right?"_

 _"Of course, Bill."_

It's too easy to lie to him sometimes.

She lifts her head from his chest and stares at the vase containing Bill's stolen seed, placed so carefully on the table beside her rickety cot as she waits for Bill's sleeping breath to even out before she gets it to Cottle to be stored. She can’t help thinking that this is not so different from that first time.

She's going behind his back, taking away his children, putting the Fleet's need for future generations over and above his own wants.

 _... All of this has happened before ..._

Her own desires and wishes vanish like the lazy curl of smoke drifting up from the herb-scented candle she extinguished as Bill drifted into sleep.

 _... All of this will happen again ..._

Her own pleasures have been reduced so much now; she can barely recall the last time she allowed herself to want more in her life than the simple pleasures of the flesh. A sweet-smelling candle, a good night's sleep, a meal made with something fresh, a few hours spent with this man, in peace and quiet.

She stopped thinking about her role in the future when the cancer was still eating away at her body, and it's hard to think of that, even now. But Bill snorts in his sleep and she stares at the vase, and suddenly the image of her classroom flashes into her mind: Ms Roslin standing behind her desk, looking down at a child who is gazing back up at her with Bill's blue eyes and serious expression.

He'd always wanted a daughter, he'd told her on one of the rare long, lazy evenings they'd been able to spend down here. Maybe it would be a girl. A girl he would probably never know, would never realise carried his blood, was his wish fulfilled. She knows of his uneasy, awkward relationship with Lee, which neither of them seems to know how to fix, even now. She knows of the anguish of Zak. Would he be a better father this time, given the chance he'll never get and doesn't want?

What of her? Maybe Laura will recognise his child the moment she steps across the threshold of the school tent. Maybe she won't, and she'll spend years unknowingly teaching someone who in other circumstances may have been part of the family.

Family. She shivers a little and eases Bill's arm away from its favourite place, slung across her hip, his hand resting between her breasts. He snorts again, rolls over, and she sits up, swinging her legs over the side of the cot, feeling exposed despite the lack of observers. Her robe is tossed over the back of her solitary chair, and she stands and shrugs it on, wrapping the cord tightly around her waist. She settles down into the uncomfortable seat and tucks her cold feet beneath herself.

It's a difficult word, family. It's been a decade since she had one connected to her by blood, the loss of them to illness and twisting, crushing metal sowing the seeds of this person she's become. The tiny beginnings of a new family she'd carefully risked building around herself shot down in a senseless hail of bullets.

For Bill, family is everything, and he gathers one around himself wherever he goes. But she … she doesn't seem to know how anymore. There's something inside her that recoils at the thought of the word now, that makes her glad that Lee has become so distant, that Tory cannot replace Billy in her affections.

 _Alone_ is her armour these days, and she huddles inside it, comfortable in its protection.

But the baby, Hera, is crawling her adorable way into Laura's heart, and she sometimes regrets that she ever chose to keep such a close eye on another of her secrets. And this man… this man wants to find his way into her heart and soul and is gently, steadily trying to wear down her defences. He chips away at the walls surrounding her, with sweetness and tenderness, succeeding more than she wants him to. More than she wants anyone to, and what does that say about her? The look in his eyes when he's inside her sometimes makes her hide her face in his shoulder so that she can't see it, like a child, hoping that if she hides her eyes, it won't be there. She'll face anything, except that.

But she never turns him away.

She's restless, uncomfortable in her own head, her thoughts churning in that way they have when her personal feelings start to leak from the lockdown she keeps them under. There's an unopened bottle of Tyrol's latest experimental brew on the table, a gift from Bill. She stands, re-igniting the candle and pouring herself a measure of the liquid glowing gold in the tawny light. This one is flavoured with herbs and berries, and the taste itself is pleasant enough, but it burns as it trickles down her throat. She stifles a cough, turning it into a silent grimace instead.

Her eyes fall on the crumpled letter beside the cot, and she bends to pick it up, smoothing the creases out and laying it on the table.

 _"... your President, Gaius Baltar..."_

They'll never not anger her, those words.

It's not the loss of power. Her classroom is the Fleet in microcosm, and she's content enough with that. It's not even really her rejection, though thoughts of that do sting, after everything. It's the knowing, the absolute, rock solid knowledge lodged like a stone in her gut that those words spell disaster for humanity. Somehow.

Disease will strike, and Baltar will not have quarantine measures in place, and hundreds, thousands will die.

An earthquake will bring this unstable city down around their ears. No disaster relief. No hope of rescue.

The Cylons will find them, and everything they've worked for will be gone in a single flash of bright white light, the few ships left on patrol not enough to prevent it.

Famine.

Drought.

Rioting.

Her mind supplies image after image just reading _"... your president, Gaius Baltar ..."_ \- four words on a crumpled page. They _burn_ like Tyrol's moonshine in her throat.

She chases the thoughts down inside her with another swallow of her drink, running a hand through the messy curls falling around her face, sliding quietly back down into the chair.

 _"The repopulation program is that frak-weasel Baltar's only reasonable policy decision."_

And she'll support it, whatever it takes. It's the one declaration of Baltar's she _can_ support, this attempt to bring more human life into the universe, to preserve the human race, by whatever means necessary. _Whatever_ means necessary. It's imperative. Inescapable. And if it means backing the man she loathes more than anyone else in the galaxy, then she'll do it.

She throws back the last of the liquor, her throat gently numbing in the way her thoughts won't. She pulls her knees up under her chin, wrapping her arms around them for comfort. Her toes curl over the edge of the seat, and she contemplates the bare nails, remembering the woman whose toenails were always red, who never left the house without a dab of her favourite scent on her pulse points, who spent lazy Sunday afternoons trying complicated new recipes in her perfect kitchen.

Who once marched across Caprica City with a placard the day the bill to repeal Gemenon's abortion ban was shot down.

Laura stares harder at her naked toes, as if they hold all the answers as to where that woman went. What would she think now of this woman who inhabits her body? Where did she come from, this woman who instigated her own abortion ban, who is, right at this moment, stealing the right to choose from a man who loves her? Was she born the day the Colonies died?

Kara Thrace once told her of the farms back on Caprica. Of the experiments the Cylons were performing on those poor humans she'd abandoned.

Betrayal after betrayal.

The people they'd left behind. Going behind Bill's back to send Kara to Caprica. The people who have died because of her orders and her choices.

Where do the betrayals stop? Is what she's doing now to Bill that much different from what the Cylons wanted to do to those poor people?

Her hands rise to press against her temples, and she squeezes her eyes closed, trying to stave off the headache threatening to arrive.

It's different. No, it's different. So different.

She holds her hands in front of her face for a moment, clamping down hard on the thoughts etching themselves like acid in her head. When she opens her eyes again, Bill has rolled over in the cot, and his sleeping face captures her gaze.

He looks so peaceful when he's asleep. So still. Calm and trusting and comfortable. She knows that if she were to slip back in beside him, his arms would gather around her automatically, pulling her close, his lips pressing themselves to her shoulder in instinctive recognition as he stirs. His body always relaxes more when she is next to him, as though only her presence allows him to rest easy.

It can’t matter that he loves her. It can’t matter even if she loved - loves - no, loved him. There are things greater in importance than Bill Adama's desires.

 _Everything_ is greater in importance than her own desires.

She tears her eyes from Bill's sleeping form and brings them again to the vase on the table next to her.

Everything.

~*~*~*~

It's early evening when she ventures out of the tent, the wide cobalt expanse of sky gently fading to purple. Bill's still asleep inside. The sounds of chatter and clink of glasses drifting from Joe's Bar, with Kara Thrace's voice rising above them in a loud, cackling laugh, make her smile as she passes. There are things that never change, no matter what, and the human need for a place to congregate and socialise and fight and love is one of them. They’re the sounds of life, and it lifts her heart to hear them.

There's always a lantern burning outside the medical tent, and she stops to inhale the faint scent of cigarettes that always lingers here. That has become a comfort, in a strange kind of way. Cottle is grumbling about something within, and she listens for a moment to another thing that never changes.

Someone opens the tent flap and exits, and Cottle catches sight of her standing outside.

"You come about the baby? I told the girl the kid only had a cold, and to stop worrying every time that child so much as coughs. I haven't got time." He wipes his hands on a cloth and motions with his head for her to take a seat. "Every idiot on this planet seems to think they're some kind of godsdamn wilderness expert. I'm treating more allergies and twisted ankles since we got here than I have in my whole career. I swear they save up the injuries for the days they know I'm planetside."

She refuses the seat, and holds out the vase. "I want you to add this to the repopulation project."

Cottle looks at her, to the vase, and back to her again. "I'm not even going to ask where the hell you got that, if that's what I think it is. Don't suppose you sterilised that thing before you used it as a damn test tube?"

She puts the vase down on the makeshift consulting table next to her and folds her arms. "I did what I could. It's important. You know that."

"How long has it been sitting in there?"

She looks at the watch on her wrist. "An hour. Maybe an hour and a half."

He sighs, picks up the vase, glances into it and hands it back to her. "Then it's probably unusable anyway. Looks dry to me. I'd go wash that up if I were you."

She frowns, taking the vase from him as he continues.

"You tell whoever donated that sample"-- he looks at her, knowingly raising his eyebrows --"that he needs to come here and do it properly in controlled conditions. It's nothing to be embarrassed about." He fumbles in his pocket for a cigarette, bringing it to his lips and lighting it, looking at her over the flickering flame between his fingers. "Didn't you have anything to do with the Colonial sex education curriculum? Don't you _know_ how long sperm is viable?"

Did she? Had she known this, from the start? That she was wasting time, that her spontaneous betrayal of Bill's trust was worthless all along?

Yes, she admits, silently. Yes.

Sabotaged by her own treacherous subconscious.

And what really counts? That her subconscious refused to allow her to betray Bill Adama yet again, or that she'd done it in the first place - talked herself into believing it was the right thing to do?

Cottle lifts the tent flap and ushers her out into the clear night air. She wishes him good night; he pats her shoulder, and she turns to walk away back home, the moon and stars bright enough for her to see her feet and save her from stumbling on the muddy path.

~*~*~*~

When Bill awakens, the vase is filled with fresh wildflowers, picked from the patch of grass that serves as a tiny communal garden to this part of the city. Laura is cutting up root vegetables in her makeshift kitchen, and on hearing the sounds of his waking, she turns her head to smile over at the cot.

Unselfconsciously naked, he rises from the blankets and moves behind her, slipping his arms around her waist and nuzzling the back of her neck.

"Missed you." He plants a kiss on her cheek, then reaches out for a piece of food and pops it in his mouth.

She affectionately raps the back of his knuckles. "It won't be long. Hungry, are we?"

"Too much exercise for this old man. There was this mischievous woman who helped me work up an appetite earlier. Which reminds me, someone deserves payback after dinner." One hand moves from her stomach to her hip, the other moving upward, and he pulls her gently back against his body, making no pretence about what that payback might entail.

He distracts her from her thoughts, and she knows why she never turns him away. She gives silent thanks for this gift he gives her, to escape for a few stolen hours from the endless spirals of her mind.

The test tube, stolen surreptitiously from Cottle's tent as he turned his back, remains in her jacket pocket - a talisman, a promise against another day, this tough decision that Bill Adama need not know about.

For now, it's enough to rest in his arms and think of nothing.


End file.
